


Satisfaction

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Novel, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-03-19
Updated: 2007-08-21
Packaged: 2019-01-19 21:36:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12418647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: I can't describe heartache or heartbreak, but I can try. Pain, greatest of all emotions human, is what love provides best.





	1. Up the Morning

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

It's always worse to wake, knowing that you have nothing to look forward to.          


That was the first thought that came to her mind. 

What a way to start the day. 

Red hair, rich, strewn across the pillows. Pale, milky-white skin, with the occasional freckle, but you'd have to be looking closely to find them. 

Lily groaned as she pulled herself up out of bed. A quick glance at the clock: it read in neat, red, digital letters. 

6:00.

Lying beside her in bed was no one. Empty space. With her feet swinging over the side of her bed and her hands on either side of her as support, she stared out her window into the strange grey dark of early morning.

Shivering, she picked up her discarded bathrobe from the floor and pulled it over her bare self. All she ever slept in were underwear bottoms. An old habit from when she actually had lovers. Heading towards the bathroom, she paused and turned around to look at her bedroom, assessing it.

White walls, some art, with lovely high windows; it was a beautiful room, in a beautiful apartment. The strange, eerie light that came through the windows illuminated the white cotton of the sheets on her bed. 

Her bed. Rumpled, of course, on only one side, another habit, the vestiges of routine. She never ventured far from the right side. One pillow tucked under her head, the other between her legs or clasped in her arms, the mocking imitation of a body to hold. 

Lily continued her inspection: lovely wooden cabinets, wooden floor with her beloved shaggy Oriental carpets, walk-in closet, a small desk, upon which an antique, ornate mirror stood, balanced against the wall. Everything in the room was tasteful, a sort of shabby, antique-chic that was much admired by her friends. Effeminate, but not overtly so. 

She wrapped herself more tightly in her bathrobe. She was still alone though. 

With that last, discomfiting thought, she quickly turned to her bathroom. 

As she turned on her shower with a quick wand wave- hot, blasting- and undressed, she wondered at her loneliness.  

Empty rooms, empty hearts.

~ ~ ~ 

 

James felt the bed move; he kept his eyes tightly shut, willing her to refrain from speaking to him.

No such luck.

"James, baby? Wake-up, it's six."

He grunted, reaching out on his left hand to grab his glasses off the nightstand. 

He always slept on the left side. 

Putting on his glasses, he blinked blearily, raising himself up with his right hand while rumpling his thick black hair with his left.

There stood Jenna, wearing a ridiculous lingerie set; it made him feel uncomfortable, as if she was trying to impress him, as if they hadn't been dating for the last year.

Annoyed, he threw off the covers and padded, naked, into the bathroom. Jenna had already turned on the shower, and he paused in front of the mirror situated above the sink.

Annoyed, he threw off the covers and padded, naked, into the bathroom. Jenna had already turned on the shower, and he paused in front of the mirror situated above the sink.

Leaning in, he regarded his face, searching for wrinkles, but stopped, instead looking straight into his own eyes.

Dark brown, deep enough to drown in. That was what Lily had told him. 

He could remember, clearly, the brightness of her smile as she teased him.

"Windows to the soul, right? Your soul's so tainted it's almost pitch black, you little devil!"

As her laughter faded in his head, he pulled back from the mirror.

It wouldn't do to start all that funny business again.

Lily was long gone.  

 


	2. Chance

Lily shuffled through the papers on her kitchen table, trying to find her work from the previous evening. In one hand she held her coffee, and with the other she flipped efficiently through the pages, one after another. The paper rustled in little shivers, and Lily was struck by the sudden memory of herself and James during their late night studies.

 

Lily lay sprawled on top of James, resting her chin atop his shoulder. He held a sheaf of notes in his hands, which he opened at random to quiz her. 

“What are the fundamental principles of human transfiguration?”�

“James…”�

“No, come on- I’m sure this’ll be on the exam. It has to be; it’s so important.”�

“No. I don’t want to study this anymore. I want to do…something else.”� She was lying on his back, and he was propped up on his elbows. She felt his shoulders tense slightly, and smiled to herself. She liked doing this to him, distracting him when she knew he couldn’t help it.

His voice, when he spoke, was hoarse. “What do you have in mind?”�

She giggled, and she whispered into his ear: she gave some lewd suggestion, some hissed perversion. Before she even knew it, they were doing it again on the floor before moving to the couch, up to her bed…

Lily blushed as her hand stilled. James had been her first lover, and thus far, her best. To put it bluntly, they had shagged like rabbits until they had suddenly combusted four months after school had ended. She still wondered what might have been if she had never found out, if she had never realized that he was sneaking around. Would she have continued to be so hopelessly infatuated? Or would she have eventually gotten tired of him, as she had with all her other boyfriends? 

She didn’t want to think about this again. She snatched up her wand and papers in one angry swoop, turning briskly to head out the door. As she slammed the door behind her, the papers were knocked off the desk by the sudden gust of air. They flew upwards and out in a whirl before drifting down like turning, falling leaves towards the floor. 

\-------------  
James watched warily as Jenna struggled to cook him breakfast. He sat at the table in just his grey slacks and glasses as he did every morning, waiting for whatever torture she served up today. He wasn’t sure why she still bothered, as invariably, the eggs would be like rubber and the toast like charcoal. He also wasn’t sure what she found so bloody difficult about cooking. It was just a simple manner of timing: make sure you don’t let the fucking things burn. 

“There!”� Jenna proudly displayed her finished product. Two eggs, this time so undercooked that their whites were still translucent, and some...thing on the side.

“Erm…Jenna, babe- what’s that there, on the edge of the plate?”�

She smiled indulgently. “Fried mushrooms.”� She poked the plate at him quite aggressively, forcing James to lean back in apprehension. “Well, go on and try it!”�

James hastily begged out, claiming that he wasn’t hungry after all. He hurried to the closet, snatching out a rather boring blue shirt and socks to go with his pants and lunged for his coat as he hopped and staggered for the door. 

Don’t let her follow me, don’t let her follow me, don’t, don’t, don’t...

Only when the door slammed shut behind him did he relax, and with a boyish shout he just about leapt down the stairs of his flat and to the world outside, which was free of all Jenna’s horrifying cookery. Looking guiltily back up at the apartment window, he hurried down the street to find a café and some decent breakfast.

\------------------  
Lily was rushing down the street for work while rummaging through her bag for her cigarettes and a light. She found a stray cancer stick at the beneath her wallet and discovered her lighter amongst some tampons. Lily was about to light up when she knocked rather abruptly into a man buying the newspaper at a kiosk. She dropped the cigarette- damn, fuck, shit, motherfucker- and apologized curtly to the man when she heard him say in an all too familiar voice, “Lily?”�

She spun around in horror. No, what could he be doing here? She had chosen this portion of London specifically because she hadn’t wanted to run into James and his cronies. This area was very far from James’ flat. She had made sure of that. 

So then what the bloody hell was Sirius Black doing here?

He was even more handsome than she remembered. She smiled weakly as he strutted towards her rather jauntily, smoking his own fag in an absurdly sexy, cocky way.

“Hey, love. Must tell you, this is a very nice surprise for so early in the day.”� He grinned down at her and offered her his own box of cigarettes. She took one silently and held it up until he lit it. He watched her closely, perhaps remembering their past intimate…endeavors. 

She exhaled, feeling rather defeated. “Hello, Sirius.”� She didn’t really want to talk to him. He had the rather irritating ability to turn her on even when she absolutely wanted to avoid anything sexual or the like. Even now, with those lips and that confident smirk, he could have probably gotten her to run to a back alley for a quickie. Unfortunately for him, she had work today, and she was already rather late.

“What’s all the rush? You certainly don’t seem too pleased to see me.”� Without waiting for an answer, he spoke again. “Are you coming to Remus’ birthday party?”�

Lily looked at him rather appraisingly. Did he really want her to go? Or was he warning her off? No, he seemed to be sincerely interested. She hadn’t seen any of the old gang since New Year’s, so she felt fairly obligated to attend this function. Even if James would there. 

Sirius studied Lily with his unsettling, frank gaze and wrapped his arm around her. “Come on Lily. I know where you work. Off we go. I expect we’ll have quite a nice chat along the way.”�

Lily resigned herself to the torturous prospect with a deep sigh. There was no way she was going to escape him. Sirius was always in control, even when he wasn’t on top. Blushing furiously at that unbidden memory, she fell into step beside the lanky Marauder. She prayed fervently that she would survive this little “walk”� unscathed. Somehow Sirius always turned these little innocent meetings into something else entirely: something dark and deep and dangerous. She shivered as he let his hand float down her back to her hip and she knew that, unfortunately, today she was going to be very unlucky.


End file.
